Eli Lilly and Company Medicines Support Efforts to Improve Health and Wellbeing for People in Kenya
For more than 20 years, Eli Lilly and Company medications provided by Lilly have helped people living with serious illnesses such as cancer, diabetes and depression in western Kenya.
This year, the Academic Model Providing Access to Healthcare (AMPATH) received more than $31 million of Lilly chemotherapy, insulin and mental health medicines – bringing the total value of medicine received to $246 million since 2002. The medications, which are not available or in limited supply through the Kenya Ministry of Health care system, are received by AMPATH partner Moi Teaching and Referral Hospital (MTRH) in Eldoret, Kenya, which serves more than 25 million people living in Kenya, Eastern Uganda and South Sudan.
The supply of products from Lilly to AMPATH is received at Moi Teaching and Referral Hospital in Eldoret, Kenya.
“Indiana University and Lilly share a mission to use research and scientific discovery to improve the lives of people in Indiana and beyond. Lilly’s support enables IU School of Medicine physicians and trainees and their Kenyan colleagues to provide world-class treatment for some of the most prevalent diseases in Kenya and around the world,” said Indiana University President Pamela Whitten.
The Lilly medications help people with cancer, diabetes and other illnesses.
IU leads the AMPATH Consortium of 15 universities around the world that partner with MTRH and Moi University in Kenya to improve health and well-being for people in underserved communities. Based on the successful partnership model in Kenya, AMPATH has recently formed new partnerships in Ghana, Mexico and Nepal supported by the Consortium.
“Lilly is grateful for AMPATH’s work to help improve the health and wellbeing of people living with often treatable diseases in Kenya,” said Leigh Ann Pusey, executive vice president of corporate affairs and communications at Lilly. “Lilly’s support of this program in Kenya over the last two decades is part of our goal to provide improved access to quality health care for 30 million people in resource-limited settings, annually, by 2030,” she added.
In addition to product, Lilly and the Lilly Foundation have separately provided philanthropic support related to several AMPATH care initiatives and the AMPATH partnerships in Ghana and Mexico. The company also sponsors a skills-based program for its employees to lend their expertise to the partnership through a program called Connecting Hearts Abroad and will have a group visiting AMPATH in Kenya later this year.
MTRH CEO Dr. Wilson K. Aruasa, MBS, EBS said, “I wish to express my sincere gratitude to Lilly and the Lilly Foundation for their long-standing support in the fight against noncommunicable diseases (NCDs) -- a major cause of disability and death globally.”
“Lilly’s long-term generosity to AMPATH has been instrumental in furthering the mission of IU School of Medicine to improve health around the world, particularly in resource-limited places such as Kenya” said IU School of Medicine Dean Jay L. Hess, MD, PhD, MHSA. “The AMPATH partnership brings together people and organizations from around the world to carry out this mission, and we are grateful that Lilly has played such an important role in this collaboration for more than two decades.”